Many off-road vehicles such as combines, tractors, bulldozers, backhoes, etc., include cup holders as an accommodating feature so that an operator may enjoy a beverage while operating the off-road vehicle. The cup holder may be mounted on a vehicle instrument panel or on a console adjacent to the operator's seat. A typical cup holder may be in the form of a rigid plastic tray that has a relatively shallow and annular cup-receiving depression that fits a range of or a particular size of beverage container(s). Some cup holders have holding features, for example deformable rubber members or fingers, that are designed to contact and keep a beverage container from moving laterally or from tipping over. When operating in level ground, such holding features may be sufficient to keep the beverage container from tipping over. However, such holding features may be ineffective to retain the beverage container in certain circumstances. For example, in circumstances with undulating terrain, the off-road vehicle may experience sudden vertical accelerations which may cause the beverage container to be vertically jettisoned out of the cup holder. As can be appreciated, it is undesirable for the beverage container to be tipped over or otherwise fall out of the cup holder.
What is needed in the art is an efficient and cost-effective retaining feature for a cup holder of an off-road vehicle.